Our grandson Henry has a pair of yellow rubber rain boots. He wears them everywhere. When he puts them on, you can see them from two blocks away.
The boots cost $24.99 at Target. His sister had a pair and loved them and now he does, too.
Henry is almost 2. He has reached the age where he knows what he likes and what he doesn't. He likes the yellow boots and does not see why he should wear anything else.
The boots sit inside the front door. Lined up. Ready to go.
He puts them on in the morning, after his morning and afternoon naps, and I suspect he would wear them to bed if he were allowed to. Those yellow boots are never far away from him and usually on his feet.
The yellow boots are versatile. Henry wears them right foot/right boot and left boot/left foot but he is not afraid to put them on toes curving outward either and when he does, he still walks straight and purposefully as if he is going to a gunfight with the bad guy in town.
The boots are sturdy. Henry looks like he could fight a fire in them. Fight a fire or manage a construction site. They say, "I'm in charge. Listen up. Here's what we're going to do."
The boots are perfect for walking through puddles. Shallow puddles, puddles up to his ankles and knee-high ones. They work well for a pile of leaves, too.
They are good for swaggering down the sidewalk, going to birthday parties, running to Jastro Park and playing on the new equipment.
The yellow boots get their share of compliments. People love the yellow boots, and like footed pajamas, they wonder why they shouldn't have a pair, too.
These are the kind of boots that inspired the lines in the "London Homesick Blues," the country song by Gary P. Nunn and Jerry Jeff Walker: "They were eyeing the prize that some people call manly footwear."
When a boy shows up at your front door, rattles the doorknob and demands to be let in, if for no other reasons than the fact that he is wearing yellow boots you do not ask questions. You open the door.
People accumulate a lot of shoes in their lives. We buy them on a whim or we do research. We have car shoes, outside shoes, garden shoes, garage shoes, tennis shoes, running shoes, to say nothing of the different sandal iterations and flip-flops.
Like most people, I have a bunch, some stacked two high because for some reason, I think I can't live without them.
However, what do you really need in life? Ask a 2-year-old, and if he were able to answer, he would say one pair of yellow rubber boots. Good for everything. Rain or shine.
Yellow boots create memories. The kind parents, grandparents and their friends or anybody who sees them will not soon forget and may remember long after his feet outgrow them.
For now, he is welcome wherever he goes. Those yellow boots are his calling card. Hard to resist, impossible not to smile. Both the boots and the boy who wears them are worth celebrating.
Email contributing columnist Herb Benham at benham.herb@gmail.com. His column appears here on Sundays; the views expressed are his own.
